Mike White shares how Georgia must respond to success, potential Top 25 ranking

Mike White isn’t worried about rankings, at least as it pertains to the Georgia Bulldogs‘ ranking.

Following a week where the Bulldogs knocked off a pair of Top 20 programs in Athens, including besting No. 17 Oklahoma 72-62 on Saturday, the Georgia head men’s basketball coach is proud of the way his unranked squad responded but knows they’ll have to be even better this coming week.

“We’ve already addressed the fact that we weren’t quite as sharp – and Oklahoma is really good, like really good, and they’re going to continue to win a bunch, they do a fantastic job – but again, they didn’t shoot it great,” White said following Saturday’s win over the Sooners. “Our detail was good. Our mental toughness was very good. We were locked in the other day. So the response for a young team after beating No. 6 was pretty good. It needs to be great. Coming into this week, it’s got to be great.”

Georgia (14-2, 2-1 SEC) is coming off back-to-back wins over Top 20 teams last week, including a dominating 82-69 victory over No. 6 Kentucky last Tuesday for its first SEC win of the season after dropping the conference opener, 63-51, at No. 23 Ole Miss.

Of course, it doesn’t get any easier with a road game at No. 1 Tennessee (15-1, 2-1) on Wednesday before hosting No. 2 Auburn (15-1, 3-0) on Saturday.

Whether that’ll be as a Top 25 program itself is yet to be seen, but White, for one, isn’t sweating Georgia‘s ranking or lackthereof.

“If (entering the Top 25) were to happen, I’d be happy for our fans. I don’t really care,” White continued. “I want to reach our potential, to reach our ceiling and continue to get better and prepare well for this next one. If it happens, or doesn’t happen, we’re still going to talk about how we handle today’s success.”

Georgia fights off Kentucky, upsets No. 6 Wildcats for first SEC win

As the saying goes, it’s tough to win on the road in the SEC. Kentucky learned that Tuesday night as Georgia held on for the upset victory.

The Wildcats got as close as five points in the second half, but the Bulldogs didn’t back down as UK went cold. That stretch proved to be the difference as Georgia got its first SEC win of the year, defeating Kentucky 82-69.

Georgia took full control of Tuesday’s game in the first half, shooting 48.4% from the field and going 5-for-12 from three-point territory. Kentucky also got into foul trouble, which sent the Bulldogs to the free throw line 12 times in the first 20 minutes – and they made every shot from the stripe.

Nick Schultz contributed to this report.